


stuck in reverse

by gossamernotes



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: AU, Gen, M/M, PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, lots of swearing, the usual bucky and steve feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-07
Updated: 2014-07-07
Packaged: 2018-02-07 21:41:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1914813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gossamernotes/pseuds/gossamernotes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's 1943 to 1965 then 1989 before 2007, and James Barnes is still alive since Steve Rogers saved him from falling off the train.</p><p>But Steve still crashes a plane into the ocean, and Bucky is left by himself in a changing world without his best friend by his side. </p><p>The only thing Bucky can do is learn to live again.</p><p>[The story wherein Bucky doesn't fall off the train, but Steve still crashes Schmidt's plane, and Bucky has to live a life without Steve by his side for nearly seventy years.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	stuck in reverse

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, well, here is my fourth story ever. I had a dream about this last night and figured it was worth spitting out on my word processors.
> 
> Please leave a comment and let me know what you think. Constructive criticism makes my heart go on!

There are moments in his life that have changed Steve. 

From his first asthma attack at six -- clawing at his chest with tears springing from his eyes because _ma, I can’t breathe_ \-- to when he won an old sketchbook during a raffle at eight and finally, at ten, when Steve decided he wouldn’t stand to be knocked around by Dillan George and his thugs on the playground nears St. Mary’s Home for Boys.

With scraped knuckles and a split lip, the boys eventually left running scared, and a hand had reached out to pull Steve back onto his wobbly knees. A crooked grin, covered in blood because even Steve could see that this kid was missing a tooth now, was waiting for him once Steve steadies himself. 

The kid straightened. “S’bout time someone showed that idiot up...didn’t expect it to be you though.”

“Don’t see why not,” Steve bristled because his size is small, and his lungs hardly work, but his heart is always in the right place. The other kid seemed to get that and shifted on his leg before swinging an arm around Steve’s twiggy neck. 

“You’re alright, punk. The name’s James, but call me Bucky, alright? We’re friends now.”

Steve had rolled his eyes, ignoring the hot feeling sparking in his chest because it had been a while since someone’s wanted to be friends with him. And, without realizing, Steve had found his best friend in that moment.

For years to come, all the moments in Steve’s life that changed him -- molding him into the do-good Brooklyn boy that all of America admires now -- involved a chip on his shoulder and Bucky by his side. 

So, when he’s flat on his back on a train, watching with wide eyes as Bucky grabs his shield and stands against a Hydra agent, Steve knows that another moment is about to pass by that will change things. And, given the heavy lead sinking in his gut, he _knows_ that this moment might not be one that changes things for the better. 

Bucky’s lips are set thin, and his arms tense once he raises the shield to cover his chest. The Hydra agent, dressed in combat gear and hefting a gun that could take out a small army, aims and shoots at Bucky before Steve can even get to his knees. The shield goes flying from Bucky’s hand, and suddenly, the whole of goddamn space and time slows down because Bucky is falling out of the train and Steve isn’t going to make it, _he isn’t going to make it_. 

Barely thinking -- moving on instinct and wild desperation -- Steve flings his aching body across the floor of the train and grabs. And the mind-numbing relief he feels once Bucky’s arm is held tight in his grasp is enough to bring tears to his eyes, but he forces himself to keep moving. Heaving his shoulder, Steve all but throws Bucky back onto the train and refuses to look at his friend until that fucking Hydra agent is nothing but a body on the ground.

Steve doesn’t kill; it’s not what he enlisted for. He didn’t go to war to shed blood or watch the light leave mens’ eyes, but as he stands over the man who tried to killed Bucky -- ripping away the only other person the world Steve has loved beside his mother -- Steve thinks about how _easy_ it would be to crush the man’s throat beneath his boots. 

But he hears something shift behind him, and before he can turn around, he feels a light touch at the back of his calf. It’s Bucky, kneeling behind Steve as if he'd been praying, and Steve wants nothing more than to fall to his knees and cry and grab onto Bucky and never let go.

Then he remembers their mission. He remembers that Zola is somewhere on this train -- yet another man who dared messed with Bucky and crossed paths with Steve Rogers before realizing their mistake -- so Steve lifts Bucky to his feet and brushes the snow off of his navy-blue coat.

He clears his throat. “You alright?”

Bucky’s lips quiver for a moment before he jerks his head into a sharp nod. “Am now.”

And then the two are off, tearing through the train, doing their best to not think about how differently that moment earlier could have gone -- and more than anything -- being grateful for the way it wound up going. 

_______

Steve hates heights. 

The day that Bucky had taken the two of them to Coney Island, it wasn’t the fair food that left Steve nauseous -- and for once -- it wasn’t because of his temperamental stomach. It was the sight of the Cyclone rising above them in the distance by the dock.

And, sure enough, Steve upchucked the second they got off the ride to Bucky’s utter amusement. 

Stuck in a crashing plane, confused by the control panel and horrified by Schmidt’s death and concussed from an earlier blow to the head, Steve sits in the pilot’s seat and feels the familiar roiling in his stomach that he had felt that day on Coney Island. 

It’s just him now in this plane, and he knows there is enough bang in this tin-can to blow New York up three times over. Sitting up straight, Steve scans the horizon and realizes that there is only one thing he can do.

For one moment, Steve wishes Bucky was with him because he'd get them out of this, but Bucky had been taken off active duty after getting shot on their last mission and was at their headquarters on solid land. But then that thought flies away quicker than this plane is crashing -- because it is, that’s what happening _right now_ \-- and Steve reaches into his pocket to pull out a compass and an old hunting knife. 

The compass -- adorned with a photo of Peggy that highlights her cupid-bow lips and coifed hair -- nearly cracks underneath his tight grip before he nestles it on the control panel. The knife, however, he stabs into the panel with a thud because Bucky -- the person who had given Steve the knife in the first place -- would have wanted Steve to let out some of his anger. 

And so he does. 

Gripping the steering mechanism, Steve breathes deep before fiddling with his radio that got knocked off its signal during his fight.

“... _Steve!_...Commandos....okay?.... _Steve_....Come in, Rogers!...”

Steve takes a deep breath once he finally locks onto the signal, wincing at all the loud voices. “Captain Rogers, checking in. Schmidt is dead. The plane is going down over the ocean. And I guess I’m doing fine.”

The other end of the radio goes silent until he hears a sharp thud. “The hell you are, Steve. Me and you are going to have a _fucking_ talk once you get back to base,” Bucky breathes, trying to cover his shaking voice with forced steel, but Steve can hear through Bucky’s bullshit.

He’s always been able to. 

The plane shudders as it continues its dive, but the only thing keeping Steve’s attention now is the voice of his best friend droning faster through his comm. 

“...such a fucking idiot, I swear. I _swear_ , Steve. I am going to lock you in a room in Brooklyn and never let you out. Might start letting in visitors, charging them as they come, to see the world’s biggest _fucking_ idiot. You hear me?”

Steve smiles. “You’re coming in loud and clear, Buck.”

“Steve, we can’t find anywhere for you to land the plane. Are there parachutes? What is there for you to use?” Peggy’s voice was unexpected -- so much so that it makes Steve’s heart thud painfully against his chest -- and he has to cough to clear the lump in his throat. 

“I’m sorry. There isn’t anything on here but those explosives. I think...I’m going to have to put it in the water.”

There is no noise from the other end, save for a grunt and whimper that Steve prays isn’t coming from Bucky’s mouth.

“Steve...,” Peggy trails off in a choked voice, and Steve shakes his head. 

“I guess I’ll need a raincheck on that dance, Peggy-”

“ _Don’t._ ”

Steve breathes deeply. “Bucky, please-”

“Don’t, Steve, don’t do it. Whatever you’re thinking, just...don’t.”

The grip he has on the steering mechanism is now tight enough to bend the metal, but blood is rushing in Steve’s ears and he can’t breathe and this is all too much too fast. 

“I have to, Buck. It’s heading right for New York,” Steve answers, hoping that Bucky will get it. Because he might love America and stand for freedom and equality, but this last mission is a selfish one. This one is personal. New York -- every dirty inch of it with its political swagger and constructed skyscrapers and noisy street vendors -- is their home. And Steve won’t stand to see it reduced to rubble under Hydra’s orders. 

The other end of the radio is quieter now, and Steve wonders if everyone has left the room to give Bucky some privacy -- which makes his heart stutter in his chest because this is really goodbye -- and then words are spilling from Steve’s mouth before he can reign them in. 

“I’m sorry, Buck. I’m real sorry that...that this is how its going to end-”

“Shut up, punk. This ain’t the end,” Bucky interrupts with a gruff voice that cracks at the end. And, if Steve hadn’t been sure before, he knows now; Bucky is having just as hard of a time not crying as Steve is. 

So, Steve bites out a laugh. “Not sure about that. It kind of feels like the end to me, Buck,” he says as he watches the water grow closer and closer to the plane as it plunges. 

“There ain’t an end to us, punk. Remember? ‘Til the end of the line?”

Steve bites his lip, drawing blood. “I remember, jerk.”

He only has seconds left before impact, and he says so, and then Bucky is suddenly screaming and shouting and begging him _steve, steve, oh god, steve, no_ but there is nothing either of them can do.

So, if Bucky passes out after Steve’s comm goes to static, Steve will never know.

Because Steve is dead.

And Bucky wishes that he was as well.

_______

 

The war ends in 1945 and millions are dead. 

It was a bloody, godawful thing that disgusts civilians and excites warmongers and Bucky _can’t_ go back to Brooklyn, not anymore. 

He stays in New Jersey -- which Steve would have called him crazy for because he hates the place -- but he hates being alone in their old apartment without Steve’s ice-cold feet to jab him awake in the middle of the night. So he joins the SSR and lives life, fighting the good fight or whatever the fuck Steve would have wanted him to do. 

Sometimes he hates Steve for it. Bucky lives his life like he’s a walking goddamn memorial for his best friend, making choices that would have made Steve proud or doing things that Steve would have wanted to do. 

But Steve hadn’t given a shit about what Bucky wanted that day on the plane or else he would still be alive and they’d both be schmoozing around Brooklyn like a couple of war heroes and Bucky has to stop himself there. 

Because _none_ of this is Steve’s fault. And he knows that. 

It’s just easier when he is able to lay the blame on someone, anyone that isn’t himself. 

Peggy and Howard and Phillips always curb themselves around Bucky, afraid he’ll fly off the handle if they so much as think Steve’s name -- which he won’t -- but they trust him enough to give him missions and take on contracts. 

By 1950, Bucky’s been to every continent there is for some sort of backwoods mission that keeps him so deep undercover that he thinks he might forget his own name -- not that he would complain at this point -- before heading back to New Jersey with a handful of new scars and pressed scowl on his face. 

It is Peggy that first notices. She was always the sharpest one of their ragtag group, so when she plucks her first grey hair from her curls, Peggy fixes Bucky with a curious stare.

“Sergeant, you’ve not aged a day since the war.”

Bucky tells her that he feels like he’s aged several _goddamn_ centuries, but when he goes back to his cramped apartment that night and looks at himself in the mirror, he knows that Peggy is right. There are no lines near his lips or crinkles poking from the corner of his eyes. His hair is still thick, and his skin glows with a youth that Bucky doesn’t feel like he deserves. 

They run tests -- well, at least Howard does -- to confirm his worst fear: Zola pumped him up with some molotov cocktail of a super serum that’s different from what Erskine created but every bit as effective. 

They tell him that he will age slowly -- _very slowly_. What they don’t say aloud is that he will outlive all of his friends and heal even if he ever did get the courage to stick his favorite pistol between his teeth when he gets desperate to see Steve on his bad days. 

So, when he tells them fuck off afterwards, it’s no surprise. 

They do as he asks. 

_______

Bucky gets reckless, and during an op in Vietnam at the tail end of the 60s, he loses his arm. 

He wakes up in the SHIELD medical ward -- one place that he’s grown accustomed to in the past twenty years -- and Peggy is sitting next to him with her hands stroking lightly at his thumb. His only thumb apparently seeing as he went off and got his other blown to kingdom _fucking_ come. She notices the moment his eyes crack open, and she twists her mouth into a pretty little line even after all of these years. 

“What are we going to do with you, Barnes,” she asks herself, and Bucky is so doped up on what’s got to be horse tranquilizers that he feels obliged to answer.

“God only knows, Agent Carter. Careful with those questions, or you’ll start sounding like Steve soon,” Bucky slurs, fully aware that he’s touching dangerous ground by bringing up his late best friend, and the tighter grip Peggy has on Bucky’s hand lets him know that she realizes what he’s doing. 

Because it has been over twenty years since Steve brought that plane down in the ocean to save the greater state of New York -- and even if Howard scours the _entire fucking Atlantic Ocean_ in hopes of finding a body -- Bucky is starting to get tired of being bitter. 

He’s tired of missing Steve too, but he knows that will never change. So it’s about time that he starts picking his battles, and him moving on is the first step towards helping himself. 

Taking the hint, Peggy stands to leave but not before brushing her slender fingers through Bucky’s greasy hair, digging her nails into his scalp softly. 

“It’s good to have you back, Barnes.” 

“Likewise,” Bucky replies as a nurse comes in with a knock, moving to let Peggy past, and starts talking him through the prosthetic that Howard has cooked up for him in the past... _shit, has it really been two months since Vietnam?_...and if he’s ready to undergo the procedure. 

For once, Bucky thinks he’s ready for a change. 

_______

The years, Bucky finds, pass in a blur of colors and sensations and headlines. He gets shot, but he’ll heal. He gets stabbed, but it won’t need stitches. He gets a round of vodka, but the liquor doesn’t even have the decency to get him drunk.

So he watches the world like a ghost in the rafters -- much like that Barton kid who Coulson is training even when Bucky’s about three seconds from shooting the kid in the ass because he’s such a _brat_ \-- and takes note as the world changes around him. 

Bucky is there when the SSR turns into SHIELD and when each of the Howling Commandos pass away -- and, _god_ , he tries not to think about Howard’s death and all the seven shades of fucked-up he left Tony to deal with -- and when Nicholas Fury is appointed the head of SHIELD operations. 

He remembers that day better than he’d like to, and just thinking about that man’s eyepatch still sends shivers crawling up Bucky’s spine. 

It’s 2007, and the world is so different that Bucky sometimes wonder what’s going to throw him for a loop next. 

Flying cars? 

Aliens? 

But Bucky has no room to talk because he’s a World War II veteran in his eighties who doesn’t look a day past thirty save for his vibranium arm and sensible clothing. He’s seen what kids wear today, snorting because he knows Steve would get a kick out of it, and sticks to relaxed denim and long-sleeves even if it’s the middle of fucking July.

His arm, while functional and more than a bit handy when he’s fighting off assassins in Kuwait, reminds him of a time in his life that he thinks is better left forgotten. 

His life now consists of bureaucratic bullshit that Fury rains upon him until Bucky’s hands go numb from writing up dossiers and mission reports. But he’s also got his SHIELD trainees that he meets with once a week in the gym and goes for their legs and twists their arms until he’s breaking a sweat. He misses the steady rhythm of combat, but when he looks into the eager shining eyes of 20-some-odd green recruits straight out of college, he knows that his window of opportunity passed years ago. 

“How are they doing?” Bucky starts at the voice before settling back into his skin.

“Coulson, I told you not to sneak up on me. I’ve killed men for less than that.”

Phil laughs like he wasn’t seconds away earlier from getting a metal hand to his throat. “I know, Agent Barnes. I have too.”

And Bucky laughs because Phil is one of the few full-fledged agents at SHIELD these days whose as much of a _shit_ as he is. Nodding back to the training group on the mat of the gym, Bucky rolls his shoulders.

“Them? They’re a bunch of self-entitled brats with trigger fingers and big mouths. They’ll fit in fine around here,” Bucky drawls, seeing Phil nod from the corner of his eye. 

Phil taps his foot. “And you? You doing alright?”

Bucky freezes, not quite getting the question, before the realization slams into him like a well-timed punch from Natasha Romanoff because tomorrow is the anniversary of Steve’s death and he almost forgot and _wow, what a shitty friend he’s become._

Clearing his throat, Bucky nods tightly. “I’m doing just fine. I got tomorrow off,” he intones, and Phil nods because he _gets_ it. 

It’s funny, really, because Bucky hated Phil when they first met in the 80s. Fury had plucked Phil from high school and nestled him into SHIELD under his wing, and he had exceeded all expectations. He was everything Fury wanted in a protégée, but underneath Phil’s clinical expression and quick wit was a boy who admired Captain America more than life itself. And Phil had let Bucky know just how much he respected the Captain and the Commandos and about how he had some sort of _fucking trading card collection_ before Bucky left the room. 

Because Captain America was just a uniform that Steve filled out with his goodness and self-sacrificing habits. And, if Phil couldn’t see past the star-spangled tights to the man wearing them, Bucky didn’t feel obligated to give him the time of day. 

Now, each of them have grown over the years, and Phil gets it because he’s talked to Bucky behind closed doors, listening to him tell stories about scrawny Steve Rogers helping ladies with their groceries or trying to climb fucking trees to save cats. 

Bucky waves Phil off as he heads out of the gym and takes a car to his apartment back in Brooklyn because he’s finally managed to clear the skeletons in his closet and come home. The next morning, Bucky avoids the TV to keep from running a metal fist through the screen when news anchors with two-dollar haircuts start to praise Captain America for his noble sacrifice or whatever bullshit propaganda they want to spin. Instead, he pulls a baseball cap -- not the Dodgers anymore, those bleeding west coast traitors -- and heads out of his apartment towards the slummier areas of Brooklyn. 

As he walks the streets, his feet lead him on because even if the buildings are different, the streets are mostly still the same as they were decades ago. He watches as polished steel and clear glass turn into chipped brick and mortar as he makes his way to an old cemetery on High Street.

After Steve’s death and the end of the war, the federal government put all of these shiny plaques around Brooklyn to connect it with Steve. They were tacked up all across the city, leading starstruck tourists and war enthusiasts to a park downtown where a giant, hulking statue of Captain America was erected amongst a garden of red, white, and blue flowers. 

And the whole thing made Bucky’s stomach churn but he understood why it was there. So he bought a plot in the cemetery where his and Steve’s parents were laid to rest and buried an empty casket for Steve beneath a simple grave marker. 

Nobody knew about the grave, but sometimes, Bucky would come around for a visit to find decorated wreaths or crayon-marked cards sitting around the plot. But no one was there today -- and for that -- Bucky was grateful. 

Standing in front of the patch of grass, surrounded by the graves of his loved ones, Bucky lowered himself to the ground and folded his legs underneath him before running a hand across the soft grass. 

“It’s been a while, Stevie. I’m sorry I’ve been away so long.”

_______

He’s heard this game before. 

Not that he’s even _close_ to giving a shit, really, but Bucky’s first thought as he steps into the set-up room is that he’s heard this game before -- _hell_ , he was sitting in the stands when it happened -- and feels the tug of hysterical laughter bubbling behind his lips. 

Because the next thing he notices in the room is a bed, and Steve Rogers is laying on it with combed blonde hair and a tight crew neck stretched over his broad chest, and Bucky can’t breathe. 

They hadn’t told him that they'd found the plane wreckage. Phil told him that earlier this morning on the phone as he was driven to the SHIELD headquarters underneath Times Square, but Fury had ordered everyone to keep their mouths shut in case Steve hadn’t survived the thawing. 

But they didn’t know how abso-fucking-lutely stubborn Steve Rogers could be -- and if he lived for seventy years in a block of ice -- he could live in the 2011 in a world where there were pocket-sized computers and actual, real-life superheroes flying around in iron suits.

When Bucky had woken up earlier in the morning to the shrill ringing of his phone, fully expecting to be called in for a mission because SHIELD needed all the operatives they could find these days, but Phil just told him to get dressed and come outside to the waiting car. 

He should have known something was different then -- maybe he had and refused to acknowledge the growing pit in his stomach -- but then Phil told him that _Steve had been found_ and _sorry we didn’t tell you but he’s alive_ and _do you want to see him?_

And, for the first time since 1943, Steve left Bucky speechless. 

Now, sitting in Steve’s bedroom and drinking in the sight of his friend’s rising-and-falling chest, Bucky moves to unplug the radio. _What a bunch of morons_ , Bucky thinks as he turns off the device and scoots his chair towards Steve’s bedside, _because does anyone actually do their research here?_ If Steve had woken up to that game playing in the background, he would have thought Hydra had captured him -- and suddenly -- SHIELD would have more to worry about than whatever the hell was in New Mexico because a cornered super soldier is never _not_ a dangerous number one priority. 

So Bucky sits and waits and waits and _waits_. The doctors had assured Bucky that Steve would wake up within the next few hours -- and Bucky had waited years to see Steve again, so a few hours seemed like nothing -- but his skin felt tight with anticipation whenever Steve’s lips would twitch or his brows would furrow. 

He figured Steve would wake slowly like he did back in their apartment in Brooklyn, rubbing his eyes open with foggy focus as his brain caught up with his body. But, nearly four hours after sitting himself next to Steve’s bed, Bucky jerks when Steve’s eyes open -- and without warning -- Steve swinging his feet under him to stand up. 

Bucky lets him go, knowing how pointless it would be to keep Steve in place. “Whoa, easy there, punk. You’re safe,” he breathes shakily because his heart is about to beat right out of his goddamn chest -- and all the air in his lungs leaves him once Steve turns around and their eyes meet. 

Steve stops. “ _B-Bucky?_ ”

And, suddenly, Bucky can’t close the distance between them fast enough. He rockets out of his chair and grabs Steve by the shoulders and squeezes tight, cradling his head in the crook of Steve’s neck and lets himself cry for the first time in years because Steve is _alive_.

Steve holds onto him just as tightly, fingers digging into the small of Bucky’s back, and Bucky knows that he needs to talk because Steve has got to be confused but that can wait a couple more minutes. So they just stand there and hold each other until Steve breaks the silence.

“Buck, what happened? What’s going on? Shit, your _arm_. C’mon, Bucky, talk to me here,” Steve rushes, and Bucky pulls away just far enough to press a hand to Steve’s chest, feeling his friend’s heartbeat and a smile threatens to cut his face wide open. 

Swallowing, Bucky takes a step back to look Steve up and down before working words from his throat. “It’s been a long time, Steve. Longer than you think.”

“I’m starting to get that now,” Steve replies with a distant look in his eyes, and Bucky thinks about this moment -- a moment that has changed everything for him and turned his _fucking_ life upside down in the best way possible -- before letting himself sit down on the edge of the hospital bed. 

Patting the spot next to him, Bucky looks at Steve. “We’ve got a lot of catching up to do, punk. You ready to get started,” Bucky asks, slipping into an old tone that he’s not used with Steve in decades, and Steve sits down before carefully taking Bucky’s hand into his own and squeezing. 

“Ready whenever you are, jerk.”

And, in that moment, the two of them start over again.

**Author's Note:**

> follow and fangirl with me on [tumblr](http://brooklynboystosupersoldiers.tumblr.com) because I love you all.
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, settings, plot lines, concepts, or terminology as created, used, and owned by Marvel Entertainment, LLC ®. This is a work of fanfiction.


End file.
